jimmy, director of our west virginia homeland security. both of these individuals were there every day and night, 24/7, for an entire week. i thank our west virginia head coach, bobby huggins, for his uplifting visit to the families. by all accounts, the explosion that took the lives of these 29 miners should never have happened in this time, in this modern era. to quote mine safety administrator who fought every hour, 24 hours a day, to help find our coal miners and i state what he said, all explosions are preventable. it's just making sure you have things in place to keep one from occurring. it's quite evident that something went very wrong here, end quote. there are multiple lares of laws and regulations in place to prevent such a disaster. there are modern technologies. there were repeated, insistent inspections and yet 29 men perished and one is hanging on in the hospital. that this deadly explosion occurred is infuriatingly frustratingly heartbreaking and i'm determined that we will get to the bottom it and ensure that steps are take